A Modern Utopia has been called "not so much a modern as a postmodern utopia." The novel is best known for its notion that a voluntary order of nobility known as the Samurai could effectively rule a "kinetic and not static" world state so as to solve "the problem of combining progress with political stability." A Modern Utopia is presented as a tale told by a sketchily described character known only as the Owner of the Voice. Interspersed in the narrative are discursive remarks on various matters, creating what Wells called in his preface "a sort of shot- silk texture between philosophical discussion on the one hand and imaginative narrative on the other.". In addition, there are frequent comparisons to and discussions of previous utopian literature. In terms of Northrop Frye's classi cation of literary genres, A Modern Utopia is not a novel but an anatomy. The premise of the novel is that there is a planet (for "No less than a planet will serve the purpose of a modern Utopia") exactly like Earth, with the same geography and biology. They have, however, "different habits, different traditions, different knowledge, different ideas, different clothing, and different appliances." The narrator's double describes the ascetic Rule by which the samurai live; this includes a ban on alcohol and drugs and a mandatory annual one-week solitary ramble in the wilderness. He also explains the social theory of Utopia, which distinguished four "main classes of mind": The Poietic, the Kinetic, the Dull, and the Base. Poietic minds are creative or inventive; kinetic minds are able but not particularly inventive; the Dull have "inadequate imagination," and the Base are mired in egotism and lack "moral sense."

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